Wearing thick-heeled shoes might make runners more prone to injury, new research shows.
People who wear flatter sneakers may have a better understanding of how their feet move during running, which could lead to fewer injuries, researchers from the University of Florida Sports Performance Center reported in a Frontiers in Sports and Active Living paper published in December.1
Researchers examined over six years’ worth of data about the injury history and shoe type features—weight, cushioning, and heel height—of more than 700 racially and ethnically diverse endurance runners ages 12 to 77. They also used special treadmills and motion capture videos to analyze running gait and asked participants to identify their particular running “foot strike,” which refers to the way the foot first touches the ground.
Those who wore thick-heeled sneakers while running had a higher injury rate. Runners with thicker heels also weren’t as accurate at identifying their foot strike as runners with flatter shoes, a likely factor in the high injury rates.
Scientists came to those conclusions after controlling for age, weight, running volume, and competitiveness.
“We observed that when runners are already running with their heels supported higher, they may have a false sense that the forefoot is striking first and often believe that they are ‘forefoot strikers,’” Heather K. Vincent, PhD, director of the UF Health Sports Performance Center and lead author of the study, told Health. “In fact, they are clearly rear foot strikers, and the heel of the shoe strikes first.”
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